Here Goes
by Kuro49
Summary: Tamsin/Mako. Canon divergence!AU. It isn't hard to tell, what Tamsin Sevier means to Mako Mori.


Inspired by historyemily's fanart on tumblr where Tamsin takes Stacker's place. Written for Femslash February.

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**Here Goes**

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There are constants in this universe even with worlds running parallel to our own, intersecting at places we least imagine them to. The Pacific Ocean, for one, and on May 15th 2016, the breach opens.

It is still Onibaba that attacks Tokyo.

The fact remains that Coyote Tango is deployed but it isn't Tamsin Sevier that passes out in her harness. It is Stacker Pentecost. That moment when he falls out of alignment, Tamsin takes on the full neural load. She screams through her pain until her voice is raw and pushes until Stacker's silence isn't paralysing in its finality.

What happens next is not a constant, there is no sure win in a fight, not in this lifetime or the next. But in this world, Onibaba still dies, still falls at the hands of Coyote Tango alone, and not the nukes standing ready to be launched.

(In that one, no one survives and Tokyo remains a ghost of a city for decades and decades that come and go.)

Standing high above with her back to the sun, when Tamsin Sevier finally manages to get out of her Conn-Pod, it is still little Mako Mori that Coyote's pilot sees.

.

There are constants in this universe, and Raleigh Becket coming back to the Hong Kong Shatterdome is not one of them. But in this one, it holds true. He follows Marshal Sevier back for one last stand against the same monsters that steals his brother from his side, time and time again.

Mako walks out into the rain, and the wind catches her hair. She has one umbrella opened, and another one tucked against her side. Her eyes follow the helicopter that lands, and when the door opens, her eyes are catching red, a start of a fire that lights the way to her core and it's always red.

What follows is not what she expects when there is a storm brewing and the man is a fraction of what she knows from pouring over the stats of the last Mark III Jaeger pilot.

Mako looks to Tamsin.

"_I imagined him differently_."

"_Better or worse_?"

And it isn't Raleigh Becket, grease still a smudge across his skin that replies. No, it is Tamsin that returns her quip, that speaks Japanese in that lowered voice of hers, that has Mako tilting the corner to her lips before she hands the man the umbrella that opens like a fan in the rain and wind.

Tamsin steps beneath Mako's, and the three of them make their way inside.

.

There are no constants in the outcome of this war.

But the fact remains that Mr. Becket needs a co-pilot.

Mako steps up to the mats, and taps out even against him.

The man calls her his co-pilot when she is still catching her breath. But even with his hand just barely touching the small of her back, it is the line of Tamsin's mouth that has her torn. The glass-shine in her green eyes, and the way she finally looks away with a curt dismissal.

.

In one world, it will be the Kaiju that raze this earth, take land and sea for their own creators. In another, it will be the people. In this, well, there are still days to go.

.

She doesn't head back to her room, and Raleigh doesn't catch her at his door. She doesn't need to tell him that it isn't obedience, that it hasn't been obedience in a long, long time. That it is respect when it comes down to Tamsin and Mako. When she knocks on another door of the Hong Kong Shatterdome, it goes unsaid. Instead, when it opens, it is Tamsin who lets her into her quarters.

.

In another life, it is Stacker that raises her from the ruins of Tokyo.

In that one, Mako Mori never acts on her love.

.

(Though she does confess where he isn't Marshal but _sensei_, where it is _aishite imasu_ instead of anything else that fills those last moments before Striker's last pilots detonate the bomb to clear a path.)

.

In this one, she does. And she does it with the same vigour as she does everything else.

.

"You can't protect me forever, Tamsin." She tells her, standing firm, ready for a fight that she knows she isn't willing to win. But the other woman just shakes her head, touches two fingers to Mako's chin until she is looking right at her.

Tamsin smiles a smile that makes Mako red herself, like she knows, has always known on a lesser level than what a drift can show.

"Haven't done that in a long, long time, Mako."

She gives her pause.

When Mako stands up on her tiptoes, and closes that distance between them, touches her lips to hers. Tamsin doesn't pull away, just brushes the blue tips from the curve of Mako's face so she can kiss her properly.

.

There are things in this world that remain the same across those lying parallel to our own. For one, Mako won't always fall in love with the pilot that raises her but she will always love them.

"I'm going to need you to protect me."

And in these last moments, with Hercules Hansen's collarbone broken still, Tamsin Sevier is stepping out of her Marshal's duties to put on a drivesuit she hasn't fit into for a long, long time. Mako cries if only because she has a tendency to lose the ones she loves.

"Can you do that?"

Mako nods through the tears rolling down her cheeks.

"Hey."

Tamsin touches Mako's chin, and that is affection and a lifetime of love standing at the edge of hope. It is there, on the Shatterdome floor, that Tamsin leans down to press her mouth to Mako's, kisses her in plain view of the remaining PPDC crew.

.

They don't always win the war, but they don't always lose either.

This one is the latter.

.

And more often than not, Striker's last pilots don't live.

But in this one, they do.

XXX Kuro


End file.
